Stillness & Surfing

The past week, we have had record breaking heat in California. Its May, and take today, it feels like the hottest day we would normally have in late August. What began as a small heat wave, has turned into almost a week of the warmest, blazing, summer like temperatures. Even the beach’s have been on fire, nighty degree’s at 9 a.m.

Twice this week, I have hightailed it down to the shore. I cancelled plans one morning, and the other, plans got cancelled on me. Both newly free mornings I spent down at the beach. Feet in the water, toes in the sand, tanned shoulders as evidence for the past week in So Cal.

My favorite thing about this week has been watching the surfers unpack their boards, toss on their wetsuits, run the sandy path’s down to the ocean line. Their buzzing with excitement, all bursting at the seams to just get their boards and their bottoms in the water. I overheard one surfer calling off his work day, completely clearing his schedule, cell-phone in hand on a Tuesday to stay and surf. My kind of guy.

The thing about surfing that’s caught my eye the most is the stillness that goes into the sport. Years ago, even before high school, before I was old enough to drive a car, I learned to surf. Summer after summer, during my adolescence, I was a “junior-lifeguard” in San Clemente. It was the best excuse for my mom to force herself to throw out the schedule and the routine, pack up the car, and three times a week, June, July and August, parade down to the pier. Truly some of the best summer memories I have growing up are being a little lifeguard in training, swimming the big wide sea, running, diving, and jumping the pier. Yes, you read that right, they let little elementary age kiddos jump off a pier. Talk about learning from a young age the beauty of learning to squash fear in the face. One jump off that splintered board, and I knew I could conquer just about anything in this life.

One of the neat things too, about all those summers was learning how to surf. Today, if you asked me if I “know how to surf”, I would say “of course”, followed quickly by “not very well”. But, it just goes to show you that learning something when your young gives you a confidence to get back on the horse later on in life.

Its been awhile since I surfed, probably at least a year or two. I think the last time I did was two summers ago, before I got pregnant. But, it my mind, I am still a sudo-surfer. I do believe my days of surfing still exist, maybe once I can do one of two things: a. convince my husband that sand is not the devil, or b. get to a point where the girls are a little older, where they can survive on the sand with me in the sea. All this week I have been watching the surfers. And they have been watching the waves. Their eyes are trained, completely focused on the next one rolling in. They jump in the water, and run with all their might, diving under one wave to paddle out past the break. They completely become in sync with the waves. They sit, they watch, and they wait.

More than just a few minutes go by before one will catch a wave, and many times it looks like no one is surfing, their all just sitting around. Watching them wait feels less like their trying to lazy, and more like their learning to live. There eyes are trained on what’s next and what’s ahead. Is this the wave they should go for? Or should they wait for the next?

The waves this week weren’t wild, one crashing into another, no stormy gales, they were slow and smooth, so pretty to watch. The waves have been flat this week, tiny, and perfectly formed. Little ripples where if one did decide to catch the wave, they stood with ease and beauty. And watch I did, mesmerized by their method of life in the water.

These surfers are modeling what it means to be still, their mold for living, is becoming a framework for my days. I am chasing down this stillness, and seeing it as a secret to more than just surfing. As cliche as this sounds, as new-agey as it might appear, I am on the hunt for more meaning and less mayhem. And, I think these San Clemente surfers are on to something after all.

The more I sit and wait, the more I quiet my thoughts, and myself, the more I calm the crazy, the better I hear. The better I can decide if I should catch this wave, or wait for the next. Another thing about these surfers, and maybe its just an observation from the shore, but it doesn’t seem like there is too much chitter-chatting going on. For my extroverted self, my talkative nature, the girl that needs to check in with everyone, touch bases, compare decisions, choices and “group think”, I inwardly cringe.

Stillness, and being less co-dependent? Lord, help me. And yet, yes Lord, more of that too. A little more of waiting, and a lot more of leaning into who I am supposed to be than chasing down what everyone wants me to be? Yes, more of that please.

It feels lazy to just sit around. To quiet the inner critic, to silence the need to be more, do more, run more, and just be still. Its scary to not check in with every one of my favorite people {everyone}, and get their opinion, their advice, their direction.

These surfers. There onto something. Their eyes on the waves, their bottoms on the board, their focus towards what might break ahead.

On my way out of San Clemente this week, as I was driving back home, car after car I passed, had surfboard after surfboard attached to their roof racks. I felt like the only car without a board on back and dripping wet wetsuit inside.

I came home and decided that this was the summer of relearning two things: stillness and surfing. June, July, and August, here we come. So since its May, and I have a little time, and with Mothers Day this weekend, instead of perfume and flowers, I have requested a wetsuit and a board. I figure that it will all come back to me, the paddling out, the standing up, the balance of staying up on the board, and riding a wave to the shore.

It’s that stillness thing that I think is going to be the hardest. To work on waiting, to work on sitting, and work on watching the waves. But, I am thinking about the end game at hand. The pulling out of the parking lot, the dripping wet wetsuit in the trunk and the sandy surfboard on my rack. I am thinking about that silly, satisfied surfing grin that all those locals have. I am focused on the drive home, what that will be like, reflecting on the waves I caught that were meant for me, the adventure I had because I stayed still long enough to catch the right wave.